A Ride Up Goodwood In The McLaren 650S Can-Am Is As Incredible As You'd Expect

It's a course that runs for just over a mile, and the drive up rarely takes longer than a minute, but there's something oh so alluring about being in a fast car as it hurtles up the famous Goodwood hill climb route. There's probably a combination of factors as to why this is (with the underwear-ruining thrill of successfully navigating the kink past the flint wall being perhaps the biggest draw), but it's highly likely that, for whatever reason, a journey up the hill is high up on a majority of gearhead's bucket lists.

A ride up Goodwood in the driver's seat still sadly alludes us, but we were fortunately allocated a spot in the McLaren 650S Can-Am's passenger seat this year. Furthermore, our chauffeur for the run would be none other than McLaren's Chief Test Driver, Chris Goodwin. Needless to say, such a combination resulted in a spine-tingling experience. Intestines were crushed into chest cavities upon acceleration; helmet-shrouded heads were sloshing about as the car was chucked into the corners; ear drums close to perforating when the 650-hp V8 (amplified by the Can-Am's uprated exhaust) approached red line. Goodwin certainly wasn't joking when he said he wanted to "see if we can catch" the 570S Sprint that started its run before us.

Of course, it isn't a surprise at all that a car of the 650S Can-Am's caliber (especially one with Chris Goodwin at the wheel) would absolutely monster the Goodwood hill climb route. But it didn't undermine for a second the experience that, even with a thesaurus at our side, we can't really find the words that we feel would do the ride justice. If you're ever fortunate enough to find yourself with an opportunity to head up Goodwood in a blisteringly fast car, regardless of which seat you're allocated in, take it immediately. Regardless of whether it's a bucket list achievement or not, the experience you'll get out of it (even if you end up, as we did, waiting three hours for the your run to start) will be oh so worth it.